The London Games is billed as the digital Olympics and powering huge swathes of this effort for broadcasters across mobile, PC, OTT and tablet is Italy’s Deltatre, writes Adrian Pennington. The company is supplying Olympic data and/or multilateral video services and/or mobile applications to the BBC and NBCUniversal Media at NBCOlympics.com, France Télévisions, RTVE Spain and Latin American digital network Terra, among other broadcast clients and media organisations. Its Strategic Business Development Director Ciaran Quinn, says online consumption will almost certainly pass a half billion. No event has hit one billion viewers before – but it may happen this summer. “The London Games will be a watershed in digital media,” he said. “There will be easily half a billion digital-only users on the official sites with which we are working, and it is highly likely that the total will pass the one billion mark. This has never been done before in the history of sports.” The number of viewers watching online on PCs, tablets or mobile devices in South America alone may top 200 million, with another 200 million in the US on Deltatre powered services alone. Akamai is the content delivery network with responsibility to deliver this massive potential demand, in conjunction with Microsoft’s cloud-based Windows Azure Media Services platform and its Smooth Streaming technology. The BBC is to use a data-driven service from Delatre to power all of its TV graphics, online statistics and analysis, and online video during the event. Deltatre will adapt an Olympic Data Feed (ODF) supplied by host broadcaster Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS) that contains all statistics related to events at the Olympic venues and is collected on behalf of OBS by Atos Origin and Omega. A version of the ODF for broadcasters will also be created and includes transmission schedule and video logging metadata. Deltratre will re-engineer the ODF into a single data set called the Olympics Results Pipeline that will power all the BBC’s TV graphics and online video. For NBCUniversal Media the company will build and support a sophisticated event-based website: NBCOlympics.com. “Watching sports via digital devices is not about just streaming video; it’s about giving the fans a complete experience bringing together photos, articles, interactive schedules, and detailed, interactive results, as well as social aspects and a feeling of community,” said Quinn. French national public broadcaster France Télévisions says it will offer viewers the most complete video and information service ever provided for an Olympic Games. David Botbol, head of multimedia in the Sports Department of France Télévisions, said: “We will complement our broadcast coverage with the finest internet coverage ever offered to our public. We think London 2012 will represent a great turning point for digital sports.” The France Télévisions’ solution includes: · DIVA – Deltatre’s broadband video player will combine France Télévisions’ channels with multilateral streams and with live sports data. · OVA (Olympic Video Applications) is a version of DIVA optimised for tablets and smartphones. OVA also integrates live sports data with the viewing experience, including live standings, team statistics and game scoring. · Gold Results for both web and mobile, including extended schedules, Country and Athlete profiles and full Medal Table. Every single result for every single event, including split times and detailed statistics will be available on France Télévisions’ website adapted for computer, tablet and mobile phone. In addition there will be direct links to much live and VoD content. A similar range of activity is planned for RTVE Spain and its website RTVE.es, about which Ricardo Villa, Director of RTVE.es, said: “We are offering the Spanish audience the best web and mobile Olympic experience than ever before. We are aware that fans expect to be able to access content from anywhere via any digital device and the London Games will set a milestone in the way people enjoys sports content in multiple devices.”
Deltatre and Sony build OB fleet In related news Deltatre is working with Sony in Europe to create an entire fleet of 16 specially designed digital graphics sports vehicles, optimised for 3D. The project is half way through completion in Italy with the final vans ready to roll by July 2012. The coachbuilder is Tomassini and systems installers are CRV. The new graphics vans will each include a 6 x 40-inch monitor wall; extensive Patch Panels allowing flexible connection to the main OB units; audio circuits for talkback; and Deltatre workstations. www.deltatre.com
